


What the water gave us

by Artherra



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Angst i guess??, Depression, Gen, i completely forgot to post it so yeah this thing is a few months old, they all should talk to a therapist, this is a lot darker than i originally intended and also written partially from spite, tw for suicide talk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-11
Updated: 2019-07-11
Packaged: 2020-06-26 15:36:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,512
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19771243
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Artherra/pseuds/Artherra
Summary: Written as a prompt request from kianraidelcamPrompt 20: "Don't try to fix me, I'm not broken."“I told you to leave me alone,” She says, not looking away from the fire in the sky. Her voice sounds tired, angry, disappointed.Markus sits next to her, careful not to touch. He hangs his legs off the edge, watches how the ink-black water moves deep in the shadows of the space far below his feet.





	What the water gave us

**Author's Note:**

> the prompt isn't copied word for word which was my mistake and i did not actually have a beta for this (shocking, i know), but i hope that you'll enjoy this!! thank you for reading!

Markus finds her on the ledge of main deck, legs hanging over the edge in the empty space. Eyes unfocused, she stares into the distance at the setting sun.

He has to admit it’s quite the sight; the sky coated in angry reds and yellows, like a fire that spreads over the horizon up into the sky, its smoke being the dark clouds overhead. It’s a view he wants to paint, someday when the fire would only be a memory and not a constant reminder of what their fight might come to. What it might require.

He knew North heard him the second he came onto the deck from the back door, the floor there unstable and prone to creak. But she doesn’t say anything. Doesn't acknowledge him, doesn’t react well until he comes closer, close enough to reach.

“I told you to leave me alone,” She says, not looking away from the fire in the sky. Her voice sounds tired, angry, disappointed.

Markus sits next to her, careful not to touch. He hangs his legs off the edge, watches how the ink-black water moves deep in the shadows of the space far below his feet.

“And you know that I can’t do that,” he replies, tries to coat his words with some kind of humor.

She doesn't smile. He hadn’t expected her to.

A beat of silence follows. He watches her, sneaks glances to where she sits, arms crossed and hands hidden. 

He doesn’t understand North; he tries, obviously, but there’s an empty space between them, an abyss that he doesn’t know how to cross. She’s different than the others; they’re all unique in their own way. But her personality stands out more, not like a person in a crowd but rather like a thorn between roses. 

Jericho hadn’t accepted his way of dialogue and pacifism easily. It was a fight of opinions, a fight against scared, traumatized souls that had never seen the good of humanity and thus saw no meaning in dialogue. It dragged, slow and tiring. Slurs were thrown around, paranoia and emotions running too wild to allow thinking a chance as Markus began to understand that he ought to learn how to cope fast, as humans would be much less open to change. It was like a training for the storm that would follow, unlike the calm before the storm, like humans said, but rather a burst of rain, a flash of lighting, before a hurricane.

But it worked. With almost everybody. Some outliers still didn’t believe, but they followed. Except for North.

She went against Markus’ ideas at every chance she got, rebelled against him in the control room and lashed out at everybody. He knows her past must’ve been harrowing. He knows she hates humans.

Markus doesn’t understand North, but he wants to. Wants to help, wants to find the parts of her which weren’t coated in gunpowder and safety measures, explosive to the touch.

“Why?” She asks after a while, throws him out of his thoughts. Her tone hasn’t changed. 

He turns to look at her again, catches a flash of her eyes, dark and deep, chocolate brown. The light makes them look more like charcoal.

“Why what?”

She groans and turns her head to look at him. “Why do you keep trying?” 

He searches for an explanation in her eyes, sees only leftover pain masked as annoyance.

“You mean…?”

She gestures with her hands, turns away, but not before he can see the flash of real annoyance. He feels a bout of his own anger but forces it down. She can't explain, it’s not her fault, he didn’t come here to argue.

He came here to help her. 

She either doesn’t realize or knows too well.

“Why do you keep stalking me! I told you to leave me alone, but you can’t. I want to be alone. _Go away_.” Her voice loses strength as she progresses from anger to exhaustion.

Markus scoffs. “I’m not _stalking_ you.”

She glares at him, silent. He feels the need to apologize, but doesn’t.

“I just…,” he begins, wondering about the words.  
“I just want to help you. That’s all.”

This time she’s the one to laugh, sharp and unhappy. “Well, you’re doing a great fucking job of that right now. Just leave. That’s how you help,” she smiles. It’s the purposefully fake pleasing-a-customer smile that she shows every time she’s being sarcastic. Markus hates it. 

“Just fucking leave, Markus. _Shoo_.” She even gestures at him.

“But-“

“No. No ‘but’s.” 

He doesn’t move; he really does want to help her, especially after the argument they’ve just had in the main room, but he doesn’t see how leaving her alone when she was would help anything.

When he just sits there conflicted and doesn’t move, she groans, clasps her hands together as the fake smile drops. 

“Listen, yeah, I appreciate what you’re doing - sure, you’ve taken it as your job or whatever to make us happy and feel good and stuff,” she begins, “But you can't do anything about this, okay? I’m an asshole, I’ve come to terms with it and now I just want to sit here. _Alone_.”

“But you can’t just-“

“Isolate myself? I can! I’m, in fact, doing that right now, or I was before you decided to waltz in here.” There’s frustration building on both sides and Markus wants it to stop. He wants to get his thoughts in line, have some time to think, to construct a solution, but she won’t let him. 

She doesn’t want him to help but he can’t let it go, doesn’t want to leave her sitting there in solitude, drowning in her own thoughts.

“North,” he stops her before she can say anything else, realizes his voice is stern and loud when the split-second of panic crosses her eyes.  
He takes a breath and continues, keeping his voice down, while she stares at him. Her eyes are wary.

“North, listen, I just want to say…,” What does he want to say? The chance of him getting to stay and actually comforting her is low, the change of him convincing her to go inside even lower. He doesn’t know how to help, where to begin. 

He can’t help one person and even then he thinks he can save an entire species. 

She waits, eyes watching the sun disappear as the colors fade.

“I just want to say I’m sorry, for what happened there,” he starts again and she immediately chuckles, unhappy and mocking, but lets him continue. “North, I...I want to help you. I don’t want you to go back there and pretend that nothing happened, I don’t. But I don’t think that sitting here alone with your thoughts is going to make you feel better.”

He can feel her disagreement but he doesn’t stop, hoping that he can at least pass a message.

“I want to know what’s wrong, North, that’s all. I want to know what happened there, what upset you. Please, just...just tell me.”

North moves so she’s facing directly at him, one leg off the ledge and one laid on the deck’s ground. Her face is closed off. She’s pissed. He looks away, stares at the waves as they crash against the sides of the abandoned, rusted-over harbor.

“You know what? Fuck you.”

His head snaps up involuntarily. She doesn’t stop.

“For the love of G-d, go and waste your therapy mojo on somebody else and just leave me be. You don't know shit about me, I don’t know shit about you, I want it to stay that way.”

Her gestures are rapid and show off exactly how angry she is, and he can only imagine what’s going on inside her head.

“Stop trying to fix me, Markus. I’m not broken, I’m not something you have to repair to make everything in here come together. The world doesn’t fucking work like that.”

He opens his mouth to speak but doesn't get a chance to.

“So, yeah, fuck off, Markus. Go to your little group, plan your own fucking suicides and just forget that I ever existed.”

The hidden meaning hits him, makes his system stutter and halt.

“You aren’t going to-“

He looks down. He fall would most certainly kill her, but there’s still 7% chance of a much worse fate. She follows his gaze. Her eyes are dark, empty, tired. The angry spark isn’t there and he wishes it was. He’d rather her be angry, rather have her on his side cracking infuriating jokes about the flaws of his plans, than this dead-man’s gaze, this yearning for an end, wherever it may be.

“Maybe. Maybe not.”

“North-“

She snaps. “Go!” 

The shout makes him wince. He hesitates, but she turns away and stares at the last remnants of light losing their fight against the blue darkness of night. She doesn’t speak again.

He doesn’t want to, but he stands up eventually and dusts down his coat. With one last glance at her sitting form, he leaves and wonders if he should've said goodbye.


End file.
